Thaddeus McCotter, a Livonia congressman, announced to a Michigan rock festival crowd Saturday he's seeking the Republican nomination for president, saying the future of the country is not big government but self government.

Joined on stage with his wife and two children (a third was at work — something, he said, all Americans should have the opportunity to do), McCotter laid out his principles of liberty, sovereignty, security and prosperity to a festival crowd of more than 400 people who were unsure about his presidential chances.

"While it is a hard road ahead, we will have better days and we will start now," McCotter said....

Immediately after the speech, McCotter picked up his American flag themed guitar and jammed with the band for a song.
McCotter, a lawyer and author who is serving his fifth term in Congress, is considered a long shot in the GOP nomination. He faces serious challenges in fundraising and national name recognition, compared to challengers like Michigan native, Mitt Romney, and tea party darling Michele Bachmann.

But supporters say it will be his message of small government will resonate and his Michigan roots and manufacturing support will change the dialog in the campaign.

◼ The North Coast celebrates Independence Day - Times StandardEUREKA
Eureka's annual Fourth of July festival features vendor booths, music on two stages, a rock wall and mechanical bull provided by North Coast Adventure Centers, a petting zoo, fire trucks, classic cars and motorcycles. The festival will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Second Street in Old Town Eureka. This year the Johnston Amusement carnival will return to the foot of “D” Street.Fireworks begin at 10 p.m. For more information call 442-9054.

ARCATA
The Fourth of July Jubilee Festival on the Arcata Plaza begins at 10 a.m. and ends at 6 p.m.
Impressive Full Schedule at the link

FORTUNA
Concurrent with the Scotia Band's performance are a baseball game, a barbecue, and a pie eating contest. (more details at the link) After the last notes are played, Fortuna's fireworks extravaganza begins at dark. Admission is free. For more information, call 725-9261, or email fortuna fireworks@gmail.com

The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), the Senate GOP's campaign arm, released a Web video that spliced images of Obama playing ping pong, drinking beer in Ireland and hitting the golf course over audio of him lashing out at congressional Republicans Wednesday for not working hard enough to hammer out a debt-reduction deal.

Cost savings from worker contributions to health care and retirement, taking effect today as part of the new collective bargaining laws, will swing the Kaukauna School District from a $400,000 budget deficit to an estimated $1.5 million surplus.... The district... plans to hire teachers and reduce class size.

Of course, Wisconsin unions had offered to make benefit concessions during the budget fight. Wouldn't Kaukauna's money problems have been solved if Walker had just accepted those concessions and not demanded cutbacks in collective bargaining powers?

"The monetary part of it is not the entire issue," says Arnoldussen, a political independent who won a spot on the board in a nonpartisan election. Indeed, some of the most important improvements in Kaukauna's outlook are because of the new limits on collective bargaining.

In the past, Kaukauna's agreement with the teachers union required the school district to purchase health insurance coverage from something called WEA Trust -- a company created by the Wisconsin teachers union. "It was in the collective bargaining agreement that we could only negotiate with them," says Arnoldussen. "Well, you know what happens when you can only negotiate with one vendor." This year, WEA Trust told Kaukauna that it would face a significant increase in premiums.

Now, the collective bargaining agreement is gone, and the school district is free to shop around for coverage. And all of a sudden, WEA Trust has changed its position. "With these changes, the schools could go out for bids, and lo and behold, WEA Trust said, 'We can match the lowest bid,'" says Republican state Rep. Jim Steineke, who represents the area and supports the Walker changes. At least for the moment, Kaukauna is staying with WEA Trust, but saving substantial amounts of money.There's more at the link

Thursday, June 30, 2011

It all had the feel of a childish tantrum by a person who desperately wishes he were living in a different reality — one in which he is the heroic man of action and his opponents are irresponsible and weak. But the fact is, the president and congressional Democrats have so far utterly failed to offer any path out of our fiscal problems — problems that they have greatly exacerbated. The president proposed a budget in February that would have increased the deficit, and then he retracted it in April and proposed nothing in particular in its place. Senate Democrats have not proposed a budget in two years; they now suggest they finally have one, though apparently it won’t really be brought to a vote. Republicans, meanwhile, have proposed a specific path out of our fiscal mess — averting a debt crisis and setting the budget on a course toward balance through discretionary cuts, budget-process reforms, and gradual but significant entitlement reforms. Rather than negotiate over that budget, the president has chosen to play the demagogue, simultaneously insisting that the budget offers nothing and that it goes too far in cutting government services (medical research, food inspectors, and the weather service are apparently in particular danger, he said yesterday, providing a kind of Salvador Dali map of postmodern lifestyle liberalism).

While I have always been wary of and have written about his dishonesty, after the speech the president delivered the 13th of April regarding the federal budget, one that was chock full of lies, deceit, and crass fear-mongering, it must be said that Barack Obama is the most dishonest, deceitful, and mendacious person in a position of power I have ever witnessed.

That performance was the culmination of four years of outright lies and narcissism that have been largely ignored by the media, including some in the conservative press and political class who are loath to call Mr. Obama what he is in the bluntest of terms: a liar and a fraud. That he relies on his skin color to intimidate, either outright or by insinuation, those who oppose his radical agenda only adds to his audacity. It is apparent that he has gotten away with his character flaws his entire life, aided and abetted by the sycophants around him, thus he is who he is and cannot change.

Public Record: That jet-tax loophole derided by the president is one he himself proposed as part of the stimulus approved by a Democratic Congress. Does the left teleprompter know what the right teleprompter is saying?

California and Governor Jerry Brown made a massive error in the formation of a California Online Tax, that amounts to triple taxation in the state for online S-corporations. Amazon and Overstock aren't the only ones hurt by the new tax, and it should be challenged in court...

And since the law just states that it's going to tax "online vendors," and says nothing about those who already pay a corporate tax, this is a massive problem that Governor Brown's created.

It sets up a massive incentive for thousands of California Corporations to just quit the state and find other homes. The simple fact is that many internet vendors who don't want to pay the tax can find all kinds of ways around it...

One day next year, Governor Brown's going to wake up to the reality of no new taxes collected, and a massive exodus of Internet vendors. By then, any retro action would be too little, too late.

Their findings also suggest that Democrats gain nothing from July 4th parades, likely a shocking result for all the Democratic politicians who march in them.

"There is no evidence of an increased likelihood of identifying as a Democrat, indicating that Fourth of July shifts preferences to the right rather than increasing political polarization," the two wrote.

The three key findings of those attending July 4th celebrations:

When done before the age of 18, it increases the likelihood of a youth identifying as a Republican by at least 2 percent.

It raises the likelihood that parade watchers will vote for a Republican candidate by 4 percent.
It boosts the likelihood a reveler will vote by about 1 percent and increases the chances they'll make a political contribution by 3 percent.

What's more, the impact isn't fleeting. "Surprisingly, the estimates show that the impact on political preferences is permanent, with no evidence of the effects depreciating as individuals become older,"said the Harvard report.

Finally, the report suggests that if people are looking for a super-patriotic July 4th, though should head to Republican towns. "Republican adults celebrate Fourth of July more intensively in the first place."

Obama referred to private jets six times in his remarks, essentially describing the Republican position on how to decrease rampant deficits as being “willing to compromise their kids’ safety so that some corporate jet owner continues to get a tax break.”

The tax incentive at issue was enacted to counteract the airplane industry’s woes in 2001 after 9/11 and reauthorized in, drum roll, Obama’s stimulus package, signed into law by the president himself.

The Post reporters made no attempt to see if there was any accuracy in that "vigor and specificity," whether Republicans opposed spend for food-safety inspectors, or whether that was simply press-conference trash talk. No pundit lauding "civility" was asked if this new "combative" tone was going to help Obama strike a deal with House Republicans. He was simply allowed to paint himself as the hero and everyone else as knaves.

Ronald Reagan is a Californian. That's what the world thinks, but he is actually from Illinois. Specifically, the northwestern section of that state. Not only was he born there, but all of his childhood, teenage years and his early adulthood were lived in small towns in this land of deep rich soil where agriculture mixes with some manufacturing to form a distinct Midwestern way of life.

Last year, Congress passed a resolution making 2011 the Reagan Centennial Year. It created a national centennial commission and encouraged the states to do the same. Some did, some didn't. California did, but Illinois, determined to fight to assert its claim to Reagan, did it in spades.

An exit by Geithner would complete the turnover in Obama’s original economic team, with Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Austan Goolsbee scheduled to leave in early August to return to the University of Chicago.

That would leave Obama with two key posts to fill as Republicans are seeking to turn the 2012 election into a referendum on Obama’s handling of the economy and the recovery is slowing. The unemployment rate rose to 9.1 percent in May, according to the Labor Department, and the U.S. economy grew at a 1.9 percent pace in the first quarter, according to Commerce Department figures released June 24.

(* Mark Halperin, editor-at-large and senior political analyst for TIME, covers politics, elections and government for the magazine and TIME.com.)

◼ The missing facts in President Obama’s news conference - The Washington Post...In a bit of class jujutsu, the president six times mentioned eliminating a tax loophole for corporate jets, frequently pitting it against student loans or food safety. It’s a potent image, but in the context of a $4-trillion goal, it is essentially meaningless. The item is so small the White House could not even provide an estimate of the revenue that would be raised, but other estimates suggest it would amount to $3 billion over 10 years....

We realize the symbolic value of things like corporate jets, particularly when Republicans appear to be refusing to accept even a single dollar of additional revenue, but Obama is misleading when he suggests that closing this loophole would make much of a dent in the federal budget. He also should made clear that he would like to raise taxes on people making more than $250,000, rather than just “millionaires and billionaires.”

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

◼ Recent scrambling by the president’s political advisers indicates they’re very worried about his reelection chances. - National JournalIt’s been a rough June for the White House. Instead of being able to run a campaign taking credit for economic improvement, President Obama will, according to the latest forecasts, be trying to win four more years amid a grim economy next year. The president’s reelection team, once hoping to run on a “Morning in America” theme now doesn’t have that luxury. No wonder, the president’s advisers over the past month have been making moves that suggest they’re awfully concerned about his prospects...Read The Rest at the National Journal

Karger, who was profiled in a June 2 OC Weekly cover story, worked for decades as a closeted gay man for powerful Republican politicians and came out of the closet about seven years ago when he retired from political consulting. Then, as is apparently required of newly out gay people, he entered the campaign to be the next president of the United States.

On June 23, 2011, Time magazine published an essay entitled “One Document, Under Siege” (one page version, here) by Richard Stengel. I consider the publication of this article to be nothing less than a scandal. Besides the deep philosophical disagreements I have with Mr. Stengel, the piece simply fails as journalism. As I will demonstrate in this post, there were fourteen objectively verifiable errors in Mr. Stengel’s piece, half of which could have been discovered simply by reading the Constitution itself...

But that pointed criticism may have done as much to raise the bar for Obama’s own activities. Tomorrow he plans to travel to Philadelphia for a Democratic National Committee fundraiser on behalf of his reelection campaign — his 31st fundraiser since January. Republicans may now start to scrutinize the Obama calendar’s eclectic mix of stumping and governing (and golfing) even as he tries to ramp up pressure on congressional leaders.

“Question: Will Obama cancel Philadelphia fundraisers tomorrow night to remain in town for debt talks?” asked Joe Pounder, the Republican National Committee’s research director, in a comment on Twitter.

They’re getting into arguments about Obama at dinner parties. They’re having to increasingly defend him, and finding it harder and harder to do so. They’re regretting their support of Obama rather than Hillary.

It's a fifth week in a row that the GOP candidate has been ahead and the widest gap between the candidates to date.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds a generic Republican candidate earns support from 46% of Likely U.S. Voters, while the president picks up 42% of the vote. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate, and nine percent (9%) are undecided.

Fred Seaman worked alongside the music legend from 1979 to Lennon's death at the end of 1980 and he reveals the star was a Ronald Reagan fan who enjoyed arguing with left-wing radicals who reminded him of his former self....

He says, "John, basically, made it very clear that if he were an American he would vote for Reagan because he was really sour on (Democrat) Jimmy Carter.

Plans for the survey have riled many doctors because the secret shoppers will not identify themselves as working for the government.

“I don’t like the idea of the government snooping,” said Dr. Raymond Scalettar, an internist in Washington. “It’s a pernicious practice — Big Brother tactics, which should be opposed.”

According to government documents obtained from Obama administration officials, the mystery shoppers will call medical practices and ask if doctors are accepting new patients and, if so, how long the wait would be. The government is eager to know whether doctors give different answers to callers depending on whether they have public insurance, like Medicaid, or private insurance, like Blue Cross and Blue Shield.

Palin has carefully left the door open to a campaign. Her appearance in Iowa was likely to encourage those who think the former Alaska governor still might jump into the wide-open race.

Palin's daughter, Bristol Palin, a mini-celebrity in her own right, showed her ability to create political buzz by saying on Fox News that her mother had made up her mind already about whether to seek the nomination and that she would like to see Sarah Palin run.

"She definitely knows," Bristol Palin said when asked whether Sarah Palin had made up her mind. She said the decision would remain within the family for now.

No one in mainstream media seems inclined to mention Barack Obama’s horrifying mistake last Thursday when, speaking at Fort Drum, he said that SFC Jared Monti was “the first person who I was able to award the Medal of Honor to who actually came back and wasn’t receiving it posthumously.” Alas, he was mistaken. He awarded the Medal of Honor to Jared Monti posthumously in 2009 and awarded the Medal of Honor in person to SSG Sal Giunta in person in 2011.

A State Department lawyer arrived on Capitol Hill Tuesday with two difficult tasks: Convince a Senate committee that the Obama administration didn’t need Congress’s approval for its military operations in Libya.

Former Georgia Democratic Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney blasted President Barack Obama on Saturday at an ANSWER coalition meeting in Washington, D.C. for engaging the United States in a war against Libya. After returning from Libya with a group of U.S. journalists, Ms. McKinney launched a U.S. speaking tour to talk about her trip.

"I took a rash step because I was so outraged that our president would launch yet another illegal, unconstitutional, immoral, war and so I also knew that my government was lying," she said to a group of 60 -70 anti-war Left attendees sitting in a Columbia Heights meeting room.

Democrat and Republican governors across the country are working to cut costs and lower taxes, but Governor Brown’s plan to level California’s $26 billion deficit – the result of several years of out of control government spending – is a “realignment” proposal that not only extends the previous administration’s ineffective tax hikes, but also irresponsibly shrugs the state’s financial burden onto the shoulders of cash-strapped county and municipal governments, creating a real threat to California’s economic recovery and public safety.

In April, Brown signed into law AB 109 - the public safety realignment bill - essentially launching a Trojan horse style attack on local governments and ensuring catastrophic consequences for Los Angeles County’s criminal justice system.

Set to take effect October 1st, this would shift responsibility for convicted felons and parolee supervision from the state prison system to county resources, transferring the state’s legal obligation to already overcrowded local jails and stressed law enforcement agencies -- without fully paying for the increased burden....

By pushing state responsibility onto the backs of local governments already slumped under the weight of a flat economy and unemployment rate at around 12 percent, California washes its hands clean of responsibility to its citizens. Despite some of the highest income, gas, sales, and business taxes in the country, the state remains blighted by a bloated bureaucracy’s tradition of spending more than it has. Even a constitutional amendment guaranteeing realignment funding can’t save existing programs from plundering....Read the rest

Monday, June 27, 2011

If there is a single moment that symbolizes President Obama’s dramatically altered reelection prospects, it was his visit to a Jeep plant in Toledo on June 3. Obama’s remarks that day were familiar. America had faced the worst recession “in our lifetimes.” His opponents had wanted to do “nothing.” The president, in contrast, had acted. As a result, “American manufacturing and American industry is back.” While there are “always going to be bumps on the road to recovery,” the future is bright and “nobody can stop us.” Employees chanted, “Yes, we can!” wearing T-shirts that read, “President Obama: Thank you” and “Obama is changing history.”

The event coincided with the release of economic data showing anemic job creation and unemployment rising above 9 percent — adding to existing concerns about high fuel costs and collapsing housing values. Outside that plant in Ohio, the cheering for Obama had been fading for some time. It was a victory lap taken before a largely silent stadium.Read the rest...

Ever since Mitt Romney's unsuccessful run for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, there's been much discussion of whether GOP voters would accept a Mormon candidate. Would evangelical conservatives, in particular, look past the former Massachusetts governor's faith to vote for him? The underlying assumption was that the more conservative the views, the more intolerant the voter.

Now, it turns out a better question might be whether Democratic voters would accept a Mormon candidate. In a survey that cuts against the media stereotype, a new Gallup Poll has found that more Democrats than Republicans say they would not vote for a Mormon for president. Twenty-seven percent of Democrats say they wouldn't vote for a Mormon, while 18 percent of Republicans say the same. For independents, the figure is 19 percent.

CHICAGO (AP) — A jury convicted former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Monday of nearly all the corruption charges against him, including that he tried to sell or trade President Barack Obama’s old Senate seat.

“We simply cannot kick the can of our problems down the road,” Bachmann said. "We can’t continue to rack up debt and put it on the backs of the next generation. We can’t afford an unconstitutional healthcare law that will cost us too much and deliver so little. We can’t afford four more years of failed leadership here at home and abroad. We can’t afford four more years of millions of Americans who are out of work and who aren’t making enough in wages to support a family.”

“We can’t afford four more years of foreign policy with a president who leads from behind and doesn’t stand up for our friends like Israel and who too often fails to stand against our enemy,” she said. “We cannot afford four more years of Barack Obama.”

Rep. Michele Bachmann officially kicked off her presidential campaign today near her childhood home in Iowa, where she touted her "Iowa values" as a constitutional conservative with a Christian background.

"I know what it means to be from Iowa--I know what we value here, and I know what's important," Bachmann said from her home town of Waterloo.

Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota formally opened her candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination on Monday, presenting herself as a forceful conservative who will confront the party’s establishment and not compromise on principles to capture grass-roots enthusiasm that has risen up in opposition to President Obama.

“I seek the presidency not for vanity, but because America is at a crucial moment,” Ms. Bachmann said. “I believe that we must make a bold choice if we are to secure the promise of our future.”

(Spoiler: The government has spent $3 billion to re-sand our nation’s beaches. Advocates claim this prevents erosion and keeps the beaches attractive to tourists. But the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the sand does nothing to prevent erosion—and this sand gets swept out to sea just as easily as existing sand! Regardless . . . taxpayers have shoveled out $3 billion for these projects.)

As you may remember, Gardiner is a clueless gardener who is mistaken for a Washington eminence and becomes a presidential adviser. Asked if you can stimulate growth through temporary incentives, Gardiner says, "As long as the roots are not severed, all is well and all will be well in the garden." "First comes the spring and summer," he explains, "but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again." The president is awed as Gardiner sums up, "There will be growth in the spring."

Kind of reminds you of Obama's approach to the federal budget, doesn't it?

Schutte would not discuss the specifics of the group’s plans for Ames, saying, “We want to surprise people at the straw poll,” but he insisted that supporters of the consumption-based tax reform would be “taking out our message in very unique way.”

...Schutte said the group considers Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn, and former Godfather’s pizza CEO Herman Cain as the strongest backers of the tax reform, with former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson more recently emphasizing the idea. Cain actually spoke at the Fair Tax tent in 2007. The group also considers Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex., a supporter of the reform, but Schutte said it was not much of a focal point of his campaign.

One of the reasons I started this blog is to educate gays about the principles of fiscal conservativism so they can see their natural home is on the Right. By casting gays out of every socializing institution and by stigmatizing gays as intrinsically evil, it is the good intentions of social conservatives that have paved the road to hell for gays. That is why another reason I started this blog is to educate social conservatives about gay equality so they can see that gay equality actually supports their core values of individual liberty, strengthening marriage and the family and creating a more moral, stable and prosperous society.

The question is: how do we break them from their prejudiced view of the GOP, particularly given how the media dwell on social conservatives’ (alleged) dominance of the movement — and the ignorance of many gay leaders of the underlying philosophy of the Republican Party as it has evolved since the nomination of Barry Goldwater in 1964 and the election of Ronald Reagan sixteen years later.

Over at Slate, Dave Weigel asks, "Can Ron Paul Win the Ames Straw Poll?" to which I'd answer: yes. As Weigel notes, Paul is actually trying to win it this time, and bought the most expensive booth available this year, the same space occupied by 2007 straw poll winner Mitt Romney. But an important follow up to this is: how badly can Tim Pawlenty afford to do in the straw poll?

Rep. Ron Paul released his floor statement: Mr. Speaker I rise to oppose this legislation, which masquerades as a limitation of funds for the president's war on Libya but is in fact an authorization for that very war. According to HR 2278, the US military cannot be involved in NATO's actions in Libya, with four important exceptions. If this passes, for the first time the president would be authorized to use US Armed Forces to engage in search and rescue; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance; aerial refueling; and operational planning against Libya. Currently, absent an authorization or declaration of war, these activities are illegal. So instead of ending the war against Libya, this bill would legalize nearly everything the president is currently doing there.

That the war in Libya can be ended by expanding it and providing the president a legal excuse to continue makes no sense. If this bill fails, the entirety of what the president is doing in Libya would remain illegal.

Welcome

Hi, I'm John Schutt, chairman of the Humboldt County Republican Central Committee: Want to get involved? We need republicans for open spots on the central committee, committee seats, letters to the editor writers, and more. Send me your thoughts and ideas on making Humboldt great again. Please feel free to call the office (442-2259) or leave a message here (or on Facebook) and I will get back to you as soon as possible.